No Boundaries(95)

They offered me food, but I barely ate anything. My stomach was tied up in knots, and there was no way I would have been able to keep anything down. All that I wanted to do was go home. I wanted to hear Luka's voice telling me that he would take care of everything again.

For the second time in my life, he was going to have to kill for me, and I hated that. It wasn't fair to ask him to do that, to break little pieces of his soul by killing people to free me. But I knew he would have to. Armani wasn't letting me go that easy.

I couldn’t believe Roberto had put out a hit on me. Somebody to kidnap me, and finish the job if I couldn’t. It was like he knew the whole time I wouldn’t go through with it. And he was that desperate to end Luka? How had he lost his way so much?

The door to the apartment swung open, and the thug moved to the side, allowing Ian and two other cronies to enter. Ian was dressed in a dark green suit with a silver tie, and there was something charming about him even though I knew I wanted to hit him. I shot him a nasty glare.

“It's time to go, Vienna. We have a meeting with your boyfriend.”

“And what are you going to do with me there?”

“Use you as a bargaining chip, of course. They know I’m ratting on them to the Agnelli’s. So now we make sure they don’t do anything about it. They close up shop, move on. Let me run guns and their restaurants and strip clubs. Make all the money.”

“You think that if you give me to them, they’ll let this all go? You’re insane. Luka will kill you for this.”

He shrugged. “I don't doubt he’ll try. I just know he won’t succeed. Too many of the Agnelli’s stand with me. Oh, by the way, someone is here to see you.”

“Who?”

“Vienna,” Roberto said as he walked into the room. He had a limp, obviously from the altercation with Luka.

“What the hell are you doing here?” I said with venom dripping from my voice. I thought Luka had disposed of him. But it was my call to make sure he lived. I was so stupid! If I had let him kill Roberto, then I wouldn’t be here.

“Making a claim. You belong with us, Vienna. And Armani says he’ll take care of our problem for us.”

“Our problem? You are the problem! Luka was trying to protect us. He didn’t go after my father for any other reason than to keep us safe!” As soon as I said it, I knew I believed it. He just wanted to protect me, always looking out for me.

Luka loved me.

Large knots formed in my stomach. They wanted war, the whole time that was their end game. And with me, they could have it. I was the catalyst, no matter what I did. Had I killed Luka, war, had we fallen in love and they killed me, war, they take all their business, war. There was no way around it.

I wasn’t going down without a fight.

I pushed myself up off the carpet and walked across the room. I forced my hands out in front of me like I was being handcuffed. “I assume you want to restrain me?”

Armani raised an eyebrow, while my uncle just ignored me. “Doubt it. Your uncle tells me you’re pregnant. You won't try anything. Not unless you want Luka to get shot in the head and then your baby will be fatherless.”

“Isn’t that the plan?” I said to Roberto.

“It’s for your own good, you know. It’ll give you the closure you need.”

“No, and it won’t give you the semblance of closure that you’re desperately clinging to. I know it won’t. Luka is a good man. But in the end, you’ll never see that side of him. Because you choose not to.”

I thought to myself that when Luka killed both of these men, they would still think he was evil. He would just prove it to them. That was on them. Not me.

This was their fault.

“Why do you want him dead?” I said, turning to Armani. I needed to hear them say it.

He smiled and it made my skin crawl. “Because I want blood and money. My needs are very simple.”

“You want war.” I spat at them.

“War is inevitable.” Roberto said before hobbling out of the door.





27





Luka





Adrenaline coursed through my body. My legs were bouncing by the time we arrived at the restaurant. My father put his hand on my knee. “Luka, be patient. We have to let him show his hand and be sure she's okay before we make any moves.”

I nodded, but my knee continued to bounce. The driver came around and opened the door for me and I slid off of the leather seat. My trusty knife was strapped to my leg as usual, but I also hid a 9mm in my pants. While I hated to actually use a gun, I would use it if I needed to. It wasn’t as personal as I liked, not close enough to the kill. If I was going to end a person’s life, I needed to be intimately involved.